Back in the Eighties, when he was one of the newcomers signed to the revived Blue Note label, Stanley Jordan caused no end of jaw-dropping with his guitar playing. Pushing his finger-tapping technique to the limits, the American virtuoso wove the sort of intricate lines that most of his peers could only hope to produce with overdubs.

Sometimes he displayed less judgment when it came to choosing material, often wandering down decorative blind alleys. Lately, he has devoted himself to the study of music therapy. The publicity material for his London date even includes a reference to his theory that interpreting the world through pure sound can help people to come to grips with the intricacies of mortgage interest.

A full decade passed before Jordan released State of Nature, which won handsome reviews last year. Jordan still looks shy and boyish, even with his 50th birthday only weeks away. At first it seemed as if pure gee-whizzery might get the upper hand as he launched into a dizzying sequence of runs underpinned by the endlessly mobile electric bass of Charnett Moffett and the muscular drumming of Kenwood Dennard. But as the set unfolded, Jordan’s lyrical side gradually came to the fore. Jobim’s Insensatez was handled with rare sensitivity, and on his unaccompanied version of My One and Only Love he reduced the room to awed silence.

Could he get away with a setting of the Andante from Mozart’s Piano Concerto No 21 without straying into Kenny G territory? Just about. Returning to the mainstream, he shifted across to the piano for a soulful treatment of Song for My Father by Horace Silver. Playing a bluesy keyboard solo with the right hand, Jordan supplied gentle guitar chords with the left before switching hands. A party trick? Perhaps. Yet he could still make it swing.

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